Alex Prager (born November 1, 1979) is an American art photographer and filmmaker based in Los Angeles. Her photographs primarily use staged actors, models and extras to create "meticulously designed mise en scène”, often described as film-like and hyperreal. Prager’s growing filmography expands the fictive realities of her still works, touching upon themes of alienation and the pluralism of modern life.
Prager began her photography practice after viewing an exhibition of William Eggleston's at the Getty Museum in 1999-2000. Her staged color photographs are described by Ken Johnson as being influenced by Cindy Sherman, Philip-Lorca diCorcia and Douglas Sirk.
In 2005, Prager created a group of works, The Book of Disquiet, as an exhibition and joint publication with artist Mercedes Helnwein. She began to gain more attention after exhibiting Polyester in 2007, which focused on Southern California and portraits of various women and girls. Her next series, titled "The Big Valley", was shown in 2008 at Michael Hoppen Gallery in London and in 2009 at Yancey Richardson Gallery in New York. In 2010, along with the series Week-End, Prager created her first short film, Despair which was based on her earlier photographic work. Inspired by the 1948 film The Red Shoes and set in 1960s Los Angeles, the four-minute film chronicles the struggle of a ballerina – played by actress Bryce Dallas Howard – whose obsession with dance conflicts with her need for love, ultimately leading her to suicide. The film was included in Museum of Modern Art's exhibition "New Photography 2010" where Prager was recognized as a notable emerging talent.
Street Fighter III: New Generation (ストリートファイターⅢ NEW GENERATION) is a fighting game in Capcom's Street Fighter series, originally released as coin-operated arcade game in 1997. Street Fighter III was produced for the CD-ROM-based CP System III hardware, which allowed for more elaborate 2D graphics than the CPS II-based Street Fighter Alpha games (the previous incarnation of the Street Fighter series), while revamping many of the play mechanics. The game, which was designed as a direct sequel to Street Fighter II, initially discarded every previous character except for Ryu and Ken (hence the "New Generation" subtitle), introducing an all-new roster led by Alex. Likewise, a new antagonist named Gill took over M. Bison's role from the previous games as the new boss character.
Street Fighter III was followed by two updates: Street Fighter III 2nd Impact in 1997 and Street Fighter III 3rd Strike in 1999. A single home version of the game was released for the Dreamcast in a two-in-one compilation titled Street Fighter III: Double Impact, which also included 2nd Impact.
Alexandra "Alex" Udinov is one of the main characters on the television series Nikita, portrayed by Lyndsy Fonseca. Many fans of "Team Nikita" (consisting of Nikita, Michael, Birkhoff, Sean, Ryan, and Owen) consider Alex as the baby of the "family," this is because Alex, being the youngest of the group, when her walls are down, can behave childlike and callow.
Alex is the daughter of the late Russian oligarch Nikolai Udinov and his wife who were murdered by Division, on orders of Sergei Semak, when Alex was a child. Udinov owned the billion-dollar company Zetrov, of which Alex was the sole heir. Alex was to inherit the Zetrov company, which flashbacks show her as never really wanting in the first place. She was saved by Nikita, after Nikita killed her father, as she watched the rest of her family perish in a fire. Nikita was powerless to save Alex from anything else as she had to return to Division, and she gave Alex to one of Udinov's associates for safe-keeping. Instead, Alex was sold into sex slavery by her father's associate since he needed money and thought no one would recognize her if he did.
Coronation Street is a British soap opera, produced by ITV Studios. Created by writer Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on ITV on 9 December 1960. It has been produced by Phil Collinson since 2010. The following is a list of characters introduced by Collinson in the show's fifty-first year, by order of first appearance. January saw three introductions; DC Moore (Pooja Shah), Marc Selby (Andrew Hall) and Frank Foster, played by former The Bill actor Andrew Lancel. Faye Butler (Ellie Leach), Jeff Cullen (Steven Houghton) and the soap's first Chinese character, Xin Chiang (Elizabeth Tan) arrived in February. Veteran actress Stephanie Cole joined as Sylvia Goodwin, the mother of established character Roy Cropper, in April.
June saw a new family take over the running of the Rovers Return for the first time as former EastEnders actress Michelle Collins and Taggart actor John Michie took on the roles of Stella Price and Karl Munro respectively. The couple were also joined by Stella's daughter Eva Price (Catherine Tyldesley). Beth Tinker (Lisa George) and Craig Tinker (Colson Smith) arrived in August and Frank's parents, Anne (Gwen Taylor) and Sam Foster (Paul Clayton) made their first appearances in September, along with Kirsty Soames (Natalie Gumede). Lesley Kershaw (Judy Holt) followed in October and Jeremy Sheffield began appearing as Danny Stratton in December. That same month saw the birth of Joseph Brown, the only child to be born that year.